The blog of avid reader, Emily Wrayburn

#WWW and #WIPpet Wednesday – 01 February, 2017

It’s time for WWW Wednesday! This blog hop hosted by Sam over at A World Of Words. Link up with us by commenting on Sam’s post for this week, and just answer the three questions.

What have you recently finished reading?

I finished Unspoken by Sarah Rees Brennan, which at first I thought was going to be my first 5* read for the year. But then as I went on, my feelings became a bit more mixed. It started off with tropes and characters I really liked, but then it veered off not necessarily bad things, but things I am less fond of and less likely to flail and squee over. Review will be along soon.

I also finished The Dark Unwinding by Sharon Cameron. It’s definitely not a standalone and I do want to read the second book, but I am going to have to buy the ebook, as neither my public library nor digital library has it. So it will wait for a bit. My review went up on Monday and you can read it here.

I also posted my review of The Creeping Shadow (Lockwood & Co.) here this week.

What are you currently reading?

I was approved for an ARC of Traitor to the Throne by Alwyn Hamilton, which is released later this week. I’m hoping to finish it in time to get a review up on Friday, though if I need to leave it until Monday, that’s okay. It took a little while but I’m getting into it now.

I also started listening to Beauty Queens by Libba Bray on audio. I went looking for one of her other books, and found this one. It’s a very black YA comedy. I’m enjoying it so far. And she is a great audio performer as well.

What do you think you’ll read next?

I actually posted a February TBR post yesterday, as I’ve got quite a few to choose from. I already have The Reptile Room (Series of Unfortuate Events #2) and Untold from the library, and I have two other pending ARCs to read as well.

What are you reading this week? 🙂

The other blog hop for this week is WIPpet Wednesday. If you’re a writer, you are very welcome to join us in this one by posting an excerpt from your WIP that somehow relates to the date. You can click the blue guy on the right of this blog to be taken to the link up. I’ve got three paragraphs today, for 01/02. Max has been reunited with some of his Aligarian Mage colleagues, but Clara is missing, and they’ve just told him that some of the Mages not loyal to Clara are also hunting for her here. Reminder that Clara has an entirely different set of memories at the moment.

Max felt his stomach knot up. “We need to get back to my Aunt. Clara – the Queen – has run off somewhere. Just now. I didn’t think she was that far ahead of me, but there’s no trace of her.”

“You’re that familiar with her?” Derek asked. “Calling her by her name like that?”

“She’s not the Queen here,” Max reminded them. “And she has no concept of being a Queen, either. We’re just her friends here.”

If anyone is interested, I’ve decided to participate in Faith Rivens‘ February challenge, Fictional Flashback February. My first post is here, introducing Clara in more detail.

It’s very disappointing! Now that I’ve actually remembered who everyone is in Traitor to the Throne, I’m starting to really enjoy it. I think I may actually end up liking it more than Rebel of the Sands, so yay!

The audio for ‘Beauty Queens’ is sheer joy. If you like it, I would also recommend her book ‘Going Bovine’. I couldn’t get into her supernatural series as much, but these two stand alones were brilliant.

omg, it’s so great! I’m always a bit wary when it’s the author narrating their own book, but she is brilliant. I saw a copy of Going Bovine at my library when I was looking for something else and I expect I will pick that up at some point, too.

To be fair, she didn’t mean to. It was kind of accidental magic-induced running off. But Max doesn’t know that yet. And yes, originally it was our reality, though I’m not sure how that really works and I’m thinking of making it another country within the characters’ world. I’m going to ponder it between drafts.

They really are, actually! I read about half of them as a 12/13yo and I just recently started from the beginning – here’s my review of book 1. He does have a very unique style, though, which I imagine is not to everyone’s taste.

Interesting snippet. I liked Max’s tense demeanor, but felt that his explanation was a little pedantic for the moment. Might be a context thing, though.

I’ve had books go off in directions that spoiled them for me. I didn’t finish the last one that happened in. It leapt about seven years in the lives of two characters – and they were children. They both changed so much, I felt I didn’t know them anymore, after investing in who they were for the first third of the book!

Ooh… I really should stop reading you blog, Emily. I always find another book to read and then another and then… 😉

This February Fictional Flashback sounds very cool too. I’ve been wondering about what Clara having “a different set memories here” meant. Hopefully now I will get a bit of a heads up. And, just on a five-second glimpse… I wish I’d known about this challenge to participate as well.